SXSW 2011
Alas, the week-long cultural cornucopia that is SXSW has come to an end. But fear not festival revelers: Thanks to the interwebs/media machine, this year’s conference lives on—and the musical presence of Seattle artists still lingers. The LA Times’ Pop & Hiss list of the “Artists, Quotes and Fights That Made an Impression” at SXSW 2011 includes a “hearty” mention of local indie-rockers The Head and the Heart (HATH) : “[This] band appears to be the real deal [….Theirs] is detail-oriented roots music, with violin-led slow-burners and harder-edged songs that shake like horses on a stampede.” The article also cites festival insights from Barsuk Records chief Josh Rosenfeld and Visqueen/Cobirds Unite’s Rachel Flotard. NPR sings the praises of HATH as well, in a SXSW retrospective that touts Seattle hip-hop troupe Shabazz Palaces to boot. Music critic Jon Pareles similarly opines on the laptop-fueled “electronic abstractions” of Shabazz in a New York Times featurethat explores SXSW’s critical mass and evolving interactive platforms. Finally, The Seattle Times’ Andrew Matson wraps up his local blog coverage of the fest with plenty of performance reviews, photos and videos not to mention the requisite SXSW taco-stand adulation. Check it all out for yourself via the links above.

Seattle Weekly
Who says music can’t help people? After tallying all the numbers from last month’s Noise for the Needy Festival, the non-profit announced that it raised $24,781 over four nights. That money will go to Teen Feed, a Seattle-based organization that serves more than 11,000 meals each year to more 600 homeless youth in the area. According a press release, those proceeds will feed 2,500 more kids this year. Plus, all the added publicity from Teen Feed inspired 40 more people to volunteer with the organization. Maybe this year’s high-quality, highly local lineup had something to do with the event’s success: headliners included The Album Leaf, Visqueen, John Vanderslice, Portland Cello Project, Horse Feathers, Tiny Vipers, The Maldives and Whalebones.

Seattle Weekly
Noise for the Needy, a five-day non-profit festival which benefits other non-profits, has announced its official lineup. The lineup is a who’s who of Seattle’s indie rock bands including Visqueen, The Maldives, Final Spins, Friday Mile, Tiny Vipers and Grand Hallway; with some national indie acts like The Album Leaf and John Vanderslice; and handful of Portlanders including Horse Feathers and Portland Cello Project. The shows will benefit Teen Feed this year, which is an organization that serves over 11,000 meals each year to over 600 homeless youth in the Seattle area. The festival is scheduled for June 10-13 at various venues in the Seattle area. Check out the full lineup at the above link.

Seattle Metropolitan Magazine
With about 37 Seattle acts having played at SXSW last week, Laura Dannen of Seattle Metropolitan Magazine wanted to find out which acts got coverage from national publications. Christopher Weingarten of Rolling Stone tweeted about Shabazz Palaces, saying “Ex-Digable Planet does impossibly funky, dubby avant-rap with shakers, kalimbas, ideas without boundaries. Truly a unique and wonderful mix that deserves to be one of SXSW 2010’s breakout stars. Get Googling!” The Dutchess and the Duke and The Moondoggies sat for short interviews with AOL Music blog Spinner.com. Paste magazine announced that Visqueen played the “Best Single-Song Performance by a Band I Really Wanted to See a Whole Set by But Missed It” for the song “Fight For Love,” saying, “It was tight and fierce and totally generous in the way most Visqueen songs are.” The New York Times ArtsBeat culture blog four-word review called Ben Gibbard’s solo set “Alone, narrative bleakness underscored.” To read more on Seattle bands at SXSW, follow the above link.

NPR
Starting at 6:00 pm PST tonight, listen online to Visqueen live at NPR Music’s showcase. The local power-pop band opens the showcase at Stubb’s in Austin, Texas tonight as part of SXSW. Visqueen will share the stage with other great bands such as The Walkmen, Sharon Jones and The Dap-Kings, Broken Bells (The Shins’ James Mercer and Danger Mouse) and Spoon. Visqueen has enjoyed great success from their recent album Message to Garcia, “a towering collection of punchy, careening power-pop.” Click the above link to listen to the show tonight!

NPR
Rachel Flotard’s charismatic stage presence and fiery vocals have helped her pick up supporting roles with Neko Case and Jon Rauhouse, but she dominates the spotlight on Message to Garcia. Barbara Mitchell of NPR writes, “The crunchy, urgent power-pop of “Hand Me Down” opens the album on a particularly auspicious note, as crunchy guitars and Flotard’s incomparable voice simultaneously destroy and mesmerize.” As its title suggests, “Hand Me Down” is rooted in a singular bond that spans generations. As long as it keeps getting passed on in rock songs this fun and familiar, that bond will never fade.